


Roses, Red and White (It's been ten years, and...)

by Anna_Hopkins



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Background Het, Canon Divergence - Post-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Domestic Fluff, Fluff and Crack, Gen, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, M/M, Tomarry Discord Secret Santa 2018, magical houses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-24 12:04:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17100266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anna_Hopkins/pseuds/Anna_Hopkins
Summary: Ron and Hermione had just put their son and daughter to bed when Kingsley’s lynx Patronus burst into the kitchen, startling Hermione into dropping her teacup. It didn’t shatter, but it spilled tea everywhere. “Potter’s been sighted in the London apparition zone,” the lynx announced with the Auror’s booming voice. Upstairs, Hugo could be heard getting out of bed at the noise; he called for them from the top of the stairs just as the lynx disappeared.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Glorilian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glorilian/gifts).



Ron and Hermione had just put their son and daughter to bed when Kingsley’s lynx Patronus burst into the kitchen, startling Hermione into dropping her teacup. It didn’t shatter, but it spilled tea everywhere. “Potter’s been sighted in the London apparition zone,” the lynx announced with the Auror’s booming voice. Upstairs, Hugo could be heard getting out of bed at the noise; he called for them from the top of the stairs just as the lynx disappeared.

 _Bugger the quiet night,_ both adults thought, jumping out of their chairs. Hermione Vanished the tea _and_ the cup in her haste to get out the door. If this sighting were really true, they couldn’t waste any time.

~

That spring in ‘98, Harry Potter had disappeared during the hour’s ceasefire and met with the Dark Lord Voldemort in the Forbidden Forest. They knew as much from Death Eater memories given during the trials in the years afterward. What happened, nobody -- even those present at the time -- knew, but by the hour’s end, both Boy-Who-Lived and You-Know-Who were gone. Without their leader, the Dark had fallen in the aftermath, and Britain had rejoiced, but wondered all the same.

This year marked the ten-year anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts, and the fifth nationwide observance of (Wizarding) Veterans’ Day, as they’d eventually compromised to name it in ‘03. It was fitting that the Savior they’d searched for would return to the public eye in time for the London celebrations; if -- they hoped -- Kingsley’s news was true.

Ron and Hermione arrived at Diagon Alley just in time to spot the crowd beginning to gather around an empty storefront near the Knockturn entrance. In their midst, the couple could see a black-haired wizard disappearing into the store without a backward glance. Between Ron’s Auror rank and Hermione’s political sway, the crowd was shortly persuaded to disperse -- leaving just the two of them to enter the building after what they hoped was their friend.

The inside was heavily magically expanded, looking more like a chapel than a shop. Ron visibly shuddered when they crossed the threshold and drew his wand, as did an alarmed Hermione. “...Harry?” the redhead called uncertainly, voice echoing down the long hallway. “Hello?”

Hermione, meanwhile, was examining the room, calculating rapidly. Was this a trap of some kind? Had they been lied to -- lured here? Somebody with a lynx patronus and a good Kingsley impression could have tricked them --

A tall figure in black robes emerged from a door or archway at the far end of the hall, gliding down the polished stone floor to meet them. The Gryffindors tensed, levelling their wands at the approaching person -- or possibly, Ron’s instincts shrieked, _vampire_ \-- with Stunning Spells readied. They only marginally relaxed when the figure stepped into the light of a chandelier closer to their end of the hall, revealing itself to be a man with long black hair tied up in a loose bun. One with bright green eyes and a distinctive scar on his forehead. “Ron? Hermione? How did you get in here?”

Ron was, contrary to his Auror training, the first to lower his wand in surprise. “...Harry? Is it really you?”

The hall’s lighting brightened from dim orange to a friendly yellow. “I guess,” Harry -- it must be Harry, Hermione decided -- answered, looking curiously between them. “Guess I wanted to see you after all,” he murmured to himself, albeit loud enough for Hermione to hear. “Shall we catch up in the kitchen? This part of the house is just decorative.”

He led them, robes billowing behind him, to a nondescript door only a few feet down the hall. Ron looked unsettled, Hermione realized, when the kitchen turned out to be much less ornate and a great deal smaller than the room they’d just been in. A relatively Muggle set of appliances was arranged against one wall, with the more magical versions taking up most of the rest of the space. An earthy, warm color scheme and soft orange lighting made the whole place feel terribly cozy, and the chairs arranged around the kitchen table were even more comfortable than they looked. Ron sat across from his wife while Harry summoned a tea tray and a large bowl of biscuits.

“So, how have you been?” Harry took a sip of his cup of tea; his sleeves slid down his forearms, showing off a black stone bangle resting loosely on his left wrist.

“Really mate, we haven’t seen you in a decade and you lead with _that_ ?” Ron’s teasing had a bit of bite to it at the end there. “I could tell you all about the past ten years, but first, tell us where _you’ve_ been.” He stared at the ornament in their friend’s hair. “Somewhere in Asia, I guess?”

“A bit,” Harry smiled. Hermione hadn’t remembered him being so annoyingly vague. “Tibet, China, Mongolia, Korea, and Japan in the East; India and Egypt a bit closer to Britain; parts of South and Central America, a few cities in the States, and plenty of northern countries. Iceland is fantastic this time of year.”

Hermione forcibly restrained herself from asking the questions that produced, in favor of the one she needed to know the most. “Are you staying for the anniversary of the Battle?”

Harry appeared to really think about it. “Hmm...maybe. We’ve got plans in Scotland this month, weather permitting. I was thinking of visiting Godric’s Hollow, too.”

Both Ron and Hermione caught onto the most relevant part of that sentence. “ _‘We_ ’?” they asked at the same time, with nearly the same inflection. Was someone else living here?

“Oh, I suppose I’ve forgotten that part.” Harry laughed softly. “I’m travelling and living with --”

Another door they hadn’t seen opened into the kitchen, and an unnaturally tall, lithe, _instantly recognizable and infamous_ wizard walked in. “Harry, love, where’s the canning jars, I’m making more preserves --” Voldemort paused when he noticed the two people at the table. “Oh, hello,” the man (monster?) said with a nod in their direction.

“--Tom,” Harry finished, looking away from his shocked-speechless friends to reply to the Dark Lord’s question. “Top shelf, next to the stove, and this is Ron and Hermione.”


	2. Chapter 2

While the Weasley-Grangers attempted to recover their speech, Voldemort opened the cabinet and took down a bunch of canning jars of various shapes, sizes and colors. “So, did they just arrive?” he questioned idly, pouring grapes from a clearly-Expanded wicker basket into a colander set in the sink. The wizard was obviously unconcerned by their presence in the kitchen -- a justifiable view, given who exactly he was.

“Around ten minutes ago,” Harry answered. He duplicated his chair and set the new one beside him at the table, filling up another teacup. “Join us? I haven’t yet asked about the situation in Britain.”

“H-Harry,” Ron squeaked, “that’s  _ Voldemort _ .” He paled even more when the wizard in question took the offered seat between him and Harry at the round table -- his freckles looked drawn-on. Hermione had her wand out, but Voldemort barely glanced at it. “This is my house you know,” he pointed out. “Terribly rude of you to try and attack me.” Ignoring it, he sipped the tea Harry had poured for him. Red eyes lit on the bowl of biscuits and summoned them closer on the table.

Hermione had no words for this situation. She wanted to shriek, but perhaps it would be smarter to -- “Finite Incantatem,” she incanted at Harry’s head. If he was Imperiused, it would do at least a little to help.

Harry blinked at her. “Didn’t know my cologne bothered you so much, ‘Mione, you could have just said something.”

“This isn’t funny, Harry, you _know_ I was checking for the Imperius.”

“I would have checked for a greater mix of compulsions, myself,” Voldemort commented in a bored tone that only served to aggravate the witch. Ignoring her glare, he looked over to Harry -- Ron would later call the Dark Lord’s expression affectionate, when his mind could reconcile ‘Voldemort’ and ‘affection’ in the same sentence. “Why did you invite these friends of yours into the Manor, anyway, darling?”

Harry sipped his tea, stalling for time to respond. “Well, you know how it is,” he murmured. “The house could tell some part of me wanted to see them.”

“Wait a minute. Isn’t this a shopfront in London? You’re calling it a manor.” Ron’s brow was furrowed in an exaggeration of confusion that Hermione called his ‘idiot mask’. He boasted of its effectiveness in interrogations -- condescending answers were still answers. The tactic didn’t quite work this time: Harry and Voldemort shared a look and simply ignored the question.

“So how have the past few years been? Tell us about Britain? I haven’t spoken English in months; I thought I’d forgotten how.”

Hermione explained, in not so many words, the Death Eater trials; the legal reforms; the end of Azkaban in favor of better prisons; rebuilding Hogwarts and the Ministry building in London; and her and Ron’s marriage and children. “In your absence, Neville and Luna are Hugo’s godparents, and Rose has Ginny and Blaise Zabini.”

“Zabini married Ginny? Wow,” said Harry, impressed. “Never thought she’d go for him.”

“We would’ve named _you_ godfather,” remarked Hermione snappishly, “if we’d known you were even bloody _alive_.”

Their black-haired friend had the nerve to shrug. “It’s probably for the best that you didn’t,” he said simply. “I’d never have managed to be around that much either way. I always meant to spend some time outside of Britain before graduating.”

With a frustrated huff, Ron set his cup forcefully down on the table. It produced a loud thud that seemed almost to echo around the room. “You can’t just brush us off like this, Harry! You’re our _best friend_ ! And...and what the _hell_ is going on with this bloody _house_? It’s making me nauseous!”

“Mm, that question I can actually answer,” Voldemort cut in with a smirk. “You’ve set foot in my lovely estate, Slytherin Manor -- or rather, castle -- and seem to have run afoul of its wards. Are you perchance here in some form of government capacity? On Ministry orders, for example?”

“...on Kingsley’s intel,” Ron groaned, holding his head in his hands. “Ugh, this is awful. Can you turn it off somehow so I can think --?”

Their best (?) friend and the Dark Lord exchanged another glance. Then, Voldemort snapped his fingers. The redhead immediately felt better. “Thank you,” he muttered, slumping back in his chair. “Now the ceiling isn’t spinning anymore.”

“How about we continue this conversation at your house tomorrow,” Harry suggested lightly. “Tom and I are still on Chinese time -- I’m getting a bit tired. We can have a proper reunion in the afternoon and I can meet the rest of the family.”

Hermione allowed Harry to usher them into an entrance hall separate from the one they’d arrived on. With his assurances, they departed via the broad double-doors --

And stepped out into the Diagon-Knockturn storefront, a dusty, empty room, as if from the storage closet behind them. The door didn’t lead back into the place they’d been, either.

“Merlin’s balls,” Ron swore, “they’re gone.”

~

“So,” Voldemort leaned back over the divan in one of many parlors, “are we going to that reunion, or were you just placating the frizzy-haired one with pretty words?”

“Of course we aren’t,” Harry murmured against his neck. “I don’t want them to interrupt us ever...again…” He drew a soft gasp from his husband, licking down the wizard’s smooth neck and shifting to press their bodies closer together at several points of contact.

Voldemort’s breath hitched; he let out a wordless hiss at the delightful friction. “ _Excellent_ ,” he breathed in Parseltongue, reaching up to card long fingers through Harry’s hair, deftly unpinning the ornaments and untying his bun. In the soft flickering firelight, Harry’s cascading locks framed his face at sharp, almost unnatural angles: he looked suave and striking and devilishly handsome, just the way he preferred.

“ _Only us, forever and ever_ ,” Harry rasped back, just before his pressed his lips to the Dark Lord’s. Thus entangled, the man could only express his agreement with a throaty moan.

Only them, forever, indeed.

\- _end_ -

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Epilogue in a bit ♥


	3. Epilogue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for minor character death in this chapter. It's entirely optional and comes after the magical house fluff.

Just as Hermione had feared, Harry did not show up to visit -- with or without the Dark Lord in tow. In the years that followed, he was never again seen among wizards, nor Muggles; for all intents and purposes, they may as well have met a pair of ghosts.

Luna's observations proved as helpful as they'd hoped, and led Hermione to a collection of notes about the Slytherin Manor Voldemort had mentioned. It was a real place, the research revealed: last visited by a non-Slytherin in the age of Merlin (that they knew of), it existed in a pocket of wizard space so heavily warded off that it might as well not exist. Because of the way the legendary place could open and close entrances and exits between anyplace, Godric Gryffindor referred to it as "Sal's Moving Castle".

The Unspeakables' notes, when Hermione gained access to them in her fifties, described attempts to replicate the effects, all of which failed; they concluded that the Castle was most likely semi-sentient or otherwise entangled with the minds of its occupants.  _Like the Room of Requirement_ , she posited.

~

Their last visit from Harry was on a shared deathbed, both of them at the ripe old age of a hundred twelve. Hermione looked up from where she lay, blinking rheumy eyes at her visitor. Was it time she took her pain relief potion?

"Hello, Hermione, Ron," said a voice she recognized. "It's been a while. I didn't know whether I should stay away -- but you two  _were_ my friends, after all." Harry — it must be Harry, even if she couldn't see him — took her gnarled hand in his own; she marvelled at the tautness of his skin, and realized.

"You're immortal." The whisper came out louder than she meant it to. "No wonder..."  _you couldn't come back._

Harry probably smiled. "I grieved you all back when I noticed it. Visiting when the difference became obvious would have been awkward at best.

"You probably hate me for being so callous —I'd hoped to make it up to you." Harry put his other hand over her eyes, ignoring her weak protest, and when he lifted it, she could  _see._

A single tear ran down her friend's cheek. He looked barely twenty, and he was smiling softly down at her. "Would you want to live forever, my friend? You're in a great deal of pain."

She had been offered this once before, as an Unspeakable. Her answer hadn't changed.

Harry glanced over to where Ron lay. Hermione followed his gaze, and took a minute to see what he was seeing.

"I offered the same thing to Ron yesterday while you slept, and he declined too." The black-haired boy chuckled. "He preferred my second offer. Not to outlive you. Age caught up with him only a minute or two ago, it seems."

With a steadying breath, Hermione turned her eyes from her husband's cooling body. "You're offering me a painless death, then," she observed quietly.

"Will you do as Ignotus did, and greet death as an old friend?" Harry's eyes fairly sparkled.

"Is that how it is," the old witch mused.

"Of all the things in the world, my husband only flies from me."

~

Two figures sat in the shade of an old willow tree. The taller one was stretched out lazily in the warm morning light, skin shimmering like a snake's scales in the dappled sun. The other toyed with a bit of vine growing around and over the willow, staring off down the hill to the village below.

The sun rose and set in that place the same as it had for a hundred years. And beyond the wind in the leaves, all was quiet.


End file.
